Balancing Act
by DeniseV
Summary: It's post 'Sweet Revenge', and Starsky and Hutch have been back on the force for a while now. But are they both really ready for active duty? Hutch is walking a tight rope to figure it out.


We were just finishing our reports on the apprehension this afternoon of the street toughs who had been terrorizing a neighborhood on our beat. The generally older people in this area had been subjected to constant harassment by these punks for a few weeks. Starsk and I had worked our tails off both day and night to capture these guys. It had started out as just harassment until three nights ago, when this gang decided to add breaking and entering to their long list of misdemeanors. The breaking and entering, along with the severe beating they gave the elderly man in the process put this case higher up in importance, not only with us, but with Captain Dobey, the commissioner and the public as well. And we were no longer talking misdemeanors.

We were both beat from the workout they gave us this morning. We had been staking out a house that Starsky's snitch Mickey told us would be where we might catch this scum. Mickey's not the most reliable of snitches, but he assured us that his information was on the up and up. We were desperate for a break in this case, so we figured it was worth the wait.

We had worked all the previous day patrolling our beat and hitting all the dives and back alleys hunting for the punks when we received a call from control saying that Mickey wanted to see us. We found him where he agreed to meet us, in this sticky, greasy pit of a bar, Dixie's. I let Starsky take the lead, as Mickey and I have never really gotten along. I know I have never fully forgiven him for not being fully up front during the whole Forrest affair. But I didn't want to scare him away if he really had some information for us.

"Hey Mickey, whaddya got?" Starsky asked him as he sat down next to Mickey in a booth. I hung back toward the entrance near the bar so as not to spook him.

"Hey Starsky, I think I got some good stuff for ya. Maybe you can catch the guys who roughed up that poor old man. That ain't right, what happened there."

"I hope you're right, Mickey. So, tell me what ya know."

Mickey leaned in close to Starsky. "I heard these guys, about six of 'em, are spending their time in a run down shack over on Culbert. In the 700 block. Most of the houses are all shut up. They might be in one of 'em." Mickey was shaking; he was obviously in the beginning throws of the DTs.

Starsky looked him dead in the eyes. "Where'd ya happen to come across this little bit of info Mickey?"

"I jus' heard it from some guys on the street. There's a lot of people afraid that these guys are gonna start into more rough stuff. We may be down on our luck, Starsky, but that don't mean we think it's right when an old man gets beat up for nothin'."

"OK, Mickey." Starsky clapped Mickey on his forearm. "Thanks for the tip. We'll check it out." He handed Mickey a ten-dollar bill, which I thought excessive considering the information we were given.

"A little generous there, weren't ya buddy?" I asked him when we got in the tomato. "I think he would have been happy with a fiver."

"Yeah, well, you're probably right, Hutch. Hopefully it'll pan out and we can close this case." Starsky was always more hopeful about Mickey's tips than I was.

So we spent the night in my LTD just down the road from a couple of boarded up houses on Culbert. Any one of these houses could be the one these guys were using, so we positioned ourselves for easy access to a number of them. Starsky was catching a few winks in the back seat when I spotted some guys coming out of the alley and up the sidewalk to one of the houses. It was about 4am, and not the time of day when law-abiding citizens would be coming home. Especially not in groups and not to an abandoned, run down house.

I slapped my magazine down on Starsky's chest a couple of times to wake him. He looked up, irritated and I whispered, "We got company."

He leaned up slowly to take a look. "Hmm, looks promisin'. What do you wanna do?"

"Well, they're back for now. Maybe we should sit tight and see what develops. They may come back out in a while to get started on their daytime activities. We can always come back later and search the house."

"True. But we could also call for back-up and grab 'em now. They're probably not expectin' anything to happen right now. I'm sure they haven't spotted us. This car looks like it was abandoned here." Starsky gave me his typical smirk when he comments on my car.

"Okay. Which way do you want?" I asked, deferring to Starsky, who seemed eager to jump and put this case behind us. I know I was dragging and I felt the same way about getting this case over with. There's no doubt that Starsky was feeling beat, too. He'd been back on active duty for five months now, but he still was working on getting back to his pre-Gunther fighting shape.

"Let's do it," he said. So, I called in for back up and we waited until it arrived before venturing over to the house. Starsky and I took the front; we had some uniforms at the back door, with Simmons and Babcock covering the alley. Dobey had insisted on sending more detectives so that if this turned out to be a good lead, we didn't lose the guys by not having proper assistance.

We crept up close to the front door and waited a few minutes until everyone had time to be in position, then pounded on the door. Starsky yelled, "Police, open up!" We only gave them moments, as we had no intention of letting them get the upper hand by better positioning themselves in the house. It was now about 5:30AM and there was just barely enough light coming in from the cracks in the boarded up windows and the door we just kicked in to let us see anybody inside.

Starsky started after one of the guys who ran up the stairs two steps at a time. I got one of the perps up against a wall pretty quickly. I heard the uniforms coming in through the back. One seemed to be having a hard time with another suspect, but was helped by his partner to subdue the guy. So far, two of our suspects were handcuffed and Starsky was nowhere to be seen. The uniforms and I, followed shortly by Simmons and Babcock, searched the rest of the house. I went up, hoping to find, or assist my partner if needed.

I got up to the third floor, where I found a window open and a fire escape. It looked like Starsky and the perp he was following went out that way. I looked out and did not see anybody around, so I hurried back downstairs and told Simmons and Babcock to follow me in search of my partner. As we ran out the door, we met up with Dobey.

"Hutchinson, what's the story?" He demanded, his usual gruff manner certainly not helped by the early morning hour.

"Check with the uniforms inside. We're headed to find Starsky. He took off after one of the suspects a few minutes ago and we haven't seen him since."

"Alright. Be careful." Dobey shouted as we ran down the porch. We split up in hopes of covering the block from all sides. They could not have gotten very far.

As I rounded my third corner, and was beginning to really get out of breath both from running and concern for my partner, I found what I was looking for, but my heart skipped a beat. It looked like Starsky had apprehended his suspect and had him cuffed. But he was down on the ground, too, sitting up against a fence and breathing heavy. As I approached, I also noticed that he was holding his stomach and was clearly in pain. I kneeled down next to my partner.

"Hey, I see you caught the bad guy. You okay?" I asked, trying to keep the excessive concern I felt down so as not to annoy my partner. Starsky and I had been through a lot during his recovery from Gunther's assassination attempt, not the least of which was getting my feelings for my partner's well being under control. I didn't need my partner to tell me I was smothering him. We ended up with this unspoken agreement, a balancing act that began during his recovery and has continued into our daily lives.

"Jeez, where the hell have you been?" I coulda used some help here." Starsky joked, even though I think there was probably some truth to what he was saying.

"Got here as fast as I could, partner." I replied. Then I asked him again, "Are you hurt?"

"The guy got in one helluva punch to my gut. And boy am I feelin' it. Can you give me a hand up?" I reached out and grabbed my partner's right arm and hoisted him up gently. He was still holding tight to his stomach with his left arm. He really looked to be hurting bad. He leaned heavily against me, still breathing pretty heavy, too. I didn't like what I was seeing, and said so.

"Starsk, maybe we should get a paramedic unit to come and look at you. You're not looking too steady there, pal." I got the evil eye from my partner at this suggestion.

"Hutch, I'm just winded, I don't need the paramedics and I don't need no hospital. I just need to walk it off. Can you grab that guy and let's get back to the house." It was clear that I was not going to win this battle, and I had to pick my battles carefully when it came to my stubborn partner, so I went along with him for now.

We met up with Babcock and Simmons on the way back to the house. Starsky did seem better by the time we got back to the house. He had convinced Dobey that he was okay, and we continued our investigation.

Although we thought there were possibly six or more punks involved in the recent crime spree in the neighborhood, we had only apprehended three from the house. The house proved lucrative in regard to evidence. We found stashes of stolen property that matched the lists provided from the people whose houses had been burglarized. These guys were obviously amateurs. Pros would have liquidated these holdings immediately. It looked like these guys were planning to fence everything all at once, and were just collecting and storing everything until they were ready to find a dealer. We probably had enough evidence to get one or more of these turkeys to cough up information about any other accomplices.

By the time we were through at the house and finished booking the suspects, it was late morning. We decided to, as quickly as possible, get our reports written and log out as soon as we could to get some much-needed sleep. We had been up now for over 26 hours and by the time we finished our reports it would be close to 30 hours before we got any sleep.

I looked over at my partner as we each began going through our notes to prepare for typing our reports. He looked bad. Exhausted and pale and definitely in pain. I decided the best thing at this point was to finish up my report as quickly as possible so that I could help Starsky with his and get him the hell out of there. We worked for the next two and a half hours, comparing notes and finalizing our reports. I grabbed Starsky's report and took both in to Dobey's office. I reached for my partner's shoulder and whispered, "Be right back." Starsky looked up at me, and nodded tiredly.

"Cap, here's our reports. We're logging out. We're pretty beat, and you know Starsky got hit pretty good today. He's hurting a little."

"Yeah. Take him home. I don't suppose you could talk him in to getting checked out at the ER?" Dobey asked.

"I don't suppose so." I responded with a weak grin. "See you tomorrow."

"Right. Good job, Hutch. Get some rest."

I went back into the squad room and Starsky looked about ready to fall over. I grabbed him up out of his chair and said to him, "Let's go Sleeping Beauty. Time for your beauty rest."

Starsky responded, "Look who's talkin' about needin' beauty rest." I had no doubt he was telling the truth. If I looked anything like how I felt, then I must look like shit.

As we got in my car, Starsky getting in more stiffly than he should, I asked him, "Are you hungry? We haven't had anything to eat since dinner last night."

"I don't think I could stay awake to eat it." Starsky replied. I could see that the last two days had drained my partner, and his body was beginning to rebel against the abuse. I decided to take him straight home and tuck him in.

When we got to Starsky's place, he looked over at me and said, "See ya tomorrow. I'm driving, right?"

I was worried. I wanted to make sure he went in, took something to help him with the pain and got in to bed comfortably. But Starsky was obviously not in the mood to be pampered. So I let it go. "Sure, I'll see you tomorrow. Regular time."

"Yep." Starsky was using fewer and fewer words with each sentence. This was clearly an indicator of how he was feeling. I felt terrible for my friend and wanted to help him if I could. But he didn't seem to want that. So I watched him get out of the car and slowly walk up the stairs to his apartment. He waved at me as I drove away.

I continued to head toward Venice Place, but felt an ever-increasing feeling of dread as I drove on. I know there was no real good reason for the way I was feeling. We are used to getting a little banged up on the job. It's all a part of being a cop. But I decided I was not going to get any sleep leaving things the way they were. The scale was starting to tip my way, and Starsky was going to have to live with it, at least for today. I turned the car around, made a quick stop at the market for something for dinner and for breakfast. The way we had been working lately, it was unlikely Starsky had any more food in his house than I had in mine.

I walked up to Starsky's door and knocked lightly on the door, but firm enough that he should have heard it. After a minute or two, I knocked again. Getting no answer, I used my key to let myself in. I was pretty prepared for what I came upon as I walked in to Starsky's living room.

My partner was laid out on the sofa, jacket and holster still on. He had his arm holding his stomach and he was curled up facing the back of the couch. I dropped the groceries on the coffee table and leaned over my partner to see his face. He had a light sheen of perspiration on his face, and his eyes were open. He was obviously exhausted, but in too much pain to fall asleep.

"Hey partner, what are you doing there?" I asked gently.

"Hutch. I thought you went home?" Starsky slurred, almost too tired to speak.

"Well, my inner demons were getting the better of me and before I knew it, I was unlocking your door. Why aren't you in bed?"

"Saw the couch and I was done in." He said. I chucked quietly. I'll bet you were, pal, I thought.

"Let's see what we can do to improve your sleeping arrangements. Besides, I think I'm gonna need that sofa tonight." Starsky looked up and smiled at me upon that last statement.

"If you say so, mother." Starsky slurred again.

I helped him to sit up and got his jacket and holster off and put them in their usual places. "Starsky, how much pain are you in? No joking here."

"Pretty bad. I have some pain pills in the medicine cabinet. Big brown bottle. I think I might need them." Starsky hated to take the pain pills, even when he was still experiencing severe pain after being shot three times by Gunther's hit men. So he had to be in pretty bad pain to be asking for them now.

"Okay. Sit there for a minute." I went to the kitchen and grabbed a glass of water, then to the bathroom for the pills. "Here. Take these. Then, I'm helping you to the bed and you're gonna sleep until you wake up. Then we'll see about getting you something to eat. How's that sound, buddy?"

"Sounds like a plan." Starsky took the pills and guzzled the water. After taking care of business in the bathroom and reducing his clothes to boxers and a t-shirt, Starsky was in bed and asleep within fifteen minutes.

I knew he would still be sore after some sleep, but the pain pills usually knocked him out so that he slept fairly soundly. But the best thing for my partner was sleep, and the best thing for me was to be nearby in case my friend needed me. Today our balancing act seemed to be working for both of us.

The End


End file.
